Family, friends surprise injured Brutus woman with renovated home

Jim Commentucci / The Post-StandardJulie Bilinski is greeted by a gathering including her family and volunteers upon her return to her completely renovated and furnished home in the Cayuga County town of Brutus today. Bilinski uses a wheelchair following her injury in a car accident in March.

Brutus, NY -- Julie Bilinski needed a ramp built on her home after a car crash last month left her paralyzed from the waist down.

What she didn't expect was for her family, friends and co-workers -- and a few strangers -- to completely remodel her house at 8692 Pump Road, in Brutus, Cayuga County, just west of Elbridge.

While Bilinski was in the hospital, they worked day and night to make over the house, which now features two entrances with ramps, and new windows, floors and doorframes. The roof has been replaced, new water and heating systems were installed and the landscape has been updated.

On Friday, more than 100 people welcomed Bilinski back to her newly renovated home.

Bilinski was crying tears of joy when she saw her updated home surrounded by her loved ones and friends.

"I never knew how many friends I had until now," Bilinski told her mother, Linda Cox-Randolph.

Grady Wheeler, a patron of Millstone Restaurant where Bilinski is the owner and manager, said he and a few others wanted to help her adjust to living at home again, so they decided to renovate a few rooms.

"Once we put our heads together, we kept rolling with it," he said. "We basically ripped it down to the frame."

As word of the project spread, more people volunteered to help and donate materials. Cox-Randolph said that community really stepped up to support Bilinski, a single mother of three children.

The Bilinski children also chipped in. Her daughter, Ashley Henry, 19, has been covering her shifts at Millstone Restaurant. And her son, Ricky Henry, 16, helped renovate the family's home.

Wheeler said most of the supplies and services were donated, but friends and family have organized a fundraiser to cover outstanding home renovation costs and ongoing medical expenses.